next story

Whoa, Come See How Even One Fast-Food Meal Impacts Your BMI

You know...sometimes, our daily lives are so busy to the point that the only way we are going to possibly have lunch is to make a quick stop at a fast-food joint. Totally get it. And while there are plenty of ways to eat well on-the-go, that's pretty hard to remember that when your stomach is rumbling and all you can think about is FOOD. NOW. But! This new research may give you some more—er, you know, food for thought.

According to a new study, for every fast-food transaction, the average body mass index of the whole country (in which that transaction took place) went up by .03.

OK, so—experts aren't all in agreement as to whether or not BMI is the most perfect weight measurement (for example: someone who is 5 feet 5 inches tall and weighs 149 pounds has a BMI of 24—a healthy weight, according to the BMI charts. But if that same person gains a pound, her BMI registers as "overweight," and who knows? That pound could be all muscle). So there's that.

But the researchers studied data on the number of fast-food transactions per capita from 1999 to 2008 in 25 countries and compared them with average BMIs in the same countries over the same period. They discovered that, for every unit of increase in yearly fast-food transactions, there was an increase in average BMI of .033 points. In general, the richer the country, the more people were eating out and the less they were walking.